Refinishing an old wood dining table

So like I mentioned in a previous post, our neighbor was getting rid of this old queen anne style dining table. I had to drag it out of a dumpster area in a parking lot in the cold rain and wheel it over to our apartment garage on a dolly. I dropped it on my foot in the process, but knew it would be totally worth it in the end. D hated this table. He said it was ugly the first time my neighbor asked if we wanted it. The next day, I was thinking about how good the table could look in our new dining room so I had to have it. I also ended up picking up 6 of these awesome tufted dining chairs on sale at Target (but of course). Link

So here is the table before I started:

Some close up shots of the nastiness:

I looked at this table and saw potential. How gorgeous it could look in our new dining room. I knew it was going to take some elbow grease to get it gleaming again. Luckily, the rain softened up the varnish so it was easier to scrape some of it off. I thought I could just use a palm sander on the rest of it until I realized it was wood veneer. So I looked up how to refinish a wood veneer table and came across a great step by step tutorial over at Fabulously Flawed. Link

I made a trip to Home depot to gather all of my supplies. This was not a cheap project. I didn't have existing stuff on hand, so my grand total was about $60 for everything in the tutorial. 

I started by putting the leaves in the table and making sure it was sturdy. I did not want to go through all that work to find out it wasn't usable in the end! The legs needed to be tightened, but other than that it was in great shape. Just needed a little TLC. 

After checking the table's sturdiness, I took all the pieces apart so it would be easier to work on.

I then put on my gloves and safety glasses and got to work. I used Klean Strip and followed directions carefully. It says on the container to let it sit for about 15-20 minutes to let the stripper soften the finish. After trial and error, I found that it works best when you apply a thin coat and give it about 1 minute before you take a plastic scraper to it. I ended up applying more coats than I thought because I let the stripper sit 15 minutes and by the time I went to scrape it, it was dried up and not scraping easily. 

After stripping the finish off, I used my palm sander to smooth out the top and remove small areas of stain & patches of varnish the stripper did not remove. I made sure to wear a dusk mask so I didn't breath in any nasty stuff. At this point, I was pretty happy with my progress. It took an entire sunday- about 6 hours working outside to get the pieces nice and clean. I was a mess and my hands hurt, but it was a labor of love. 

Working on the legs was a little more difficult since they are all curved surfaces. I used a scouring pad and steel wool to remove the finish. Here you can see the before and after of the legs.

I also had to reattach a piece of veneer that came off the table edge. I carefully stripped the finish off then used titebond wood glue and painters tape to reattach.

So finally the hard part was over and all of the pieces were stripped and sanded. I wiped them down with mineral spirits and let them dry overnight. 

Next step was to stain the table. I started by using Minwax wood conditioner on the legs. After wipign that on with a rag, I used Minwax stain in dark walnut. I used a foam brush to apply an even coat on each of the legs.

The stain looked extremely dark, but after about 10 minutes I wiped it off and it wasn't very dark at all. Here's a before and after picture, the one on the left has wood conditioner and on the right it has one coat of stain. I thought about applying a second coat, but when I held one of the new Threshold chair legs against it, the color was very similar so I decided to keep it. 

Here are all 4 table legs with 1 coat of stain applied and wiped off. There is a bit of variation in the color, but I think that is more due to the nature of the wood. It adds character :)

I let the legs dry overnight and the next day planned how I was going to tackle the table top. I checked the legs and they were still a bit tacky, but it was very humid outside. I read online it can take anywhere from 24 to 48 hours to dry, so I left them alone. I decided it would be best to do the table top last, and it would be easier to access the table edge if it was laying upside down, so that's how I stained the underside of the table edge. I was very careful not to apply too much stain and let it run to the other side which would have left ugly marks on the table top. I also wiped off the edge with a rag as I went to make sure i would have a clean line when I applied the stain on the top and edge. 

After all of the edges were stained, I decided to reattach the legs so that I could flip it over and do the table top. I would not recommend attempting this on your own, but D was at work and I am impatient :)

I took a step back so I could see how the color looked and the legs matched the table edge pretty well. I attempted to flip it over after removing the 2 leaves and man this table is solid.

Don't mind the mess in the background, I did this in the garage while we were in the process of packing for our big move. My next step was the defining moment- applying the stain to the table top. This could make it or break it- depending on how the wood grained showed through the stain. I applied the stain very carefully, in long even strokes one section at a time. This time, I decided to let the stain soak in about 30 minutes before wiping it off. It took a lot of elbow grease to get the stain off and I realized a very important tip - USE A RAG TO APPLY YOUR STAIN. I used a foam brush and it pretty much made this whole process take ten times longer than it should have. The foam brush applies too much stain in a heavy thick coat so it has a hard time penetrating the wood and drying. It was very difficult to get the excess stain off of the wood. Once I did, there was still a sticky film of stain over the top. I used the rag to even out some spots and realized how much easier it was to apply stain with a rag and I wished I would have done that all along. 

This is how the table looked once I removed the excess stain with a rag and touched up some areas by applying additional stain with a rag. I definitely had more control of the stain when I applied with a rag. 

At this point it looked pretty great and I let it dry overnight before putting on the polyurethane topcoat the next day. I read the back of the can of poly and it said let stain dry at least 8 hours. Well, it had been at least 12 so I figured it was good right? Wrong. I stirred the can of poly (never shake!) and used a foam brush to apply it. Little pieces of the foam brush seemed to be disintegrating onto the table.  So what did I do next? I decided to wipe the table down with a clean rag to get the little bits of foam off. Bad idea. The rag started to lift the poly off along with the stain. I think this was because the stain was not fully dry due to it being applied so heavily with the foam brush. I swear, it seemed like nothing was going right with this project. I asked D to come take a look and see if it looked ok, and he shook his head. The finish now looked very uneven and lighter in some areas.  I went inside and pouted for about 20 minutes thinking of how I was going to have to let it dry, sand it down and start over. I then decided to try one thing. I soaked a rag in mineral spirits and wiped down the entire table top with it. After wiping it very throughly to remove the poly coat, the table looked much better! It seemed to even out the finish a little more and removed all excess stain and poly. Phew! I didn't have to re-sand it! Doesn't look too bad. I knew it would look great in the end no matter how difficult and frustrating it was to get there!

After letting it thoroughly dry overnight, I used a RAG to apply the stain in the areas that needed it to even out the finish. 

Here's the final result:

And a close up:

It turned out so nice. I need to tell my old neighbor thank you! ;)